Catalogue

TD01 – Biosphere & Jon Wozencroft “Substrata 2.1”

27th May 2010 » Permalink: TD01 – Biosphere & Jon Wozencroft “Substrata 2.1”

A3 archival print edition + exclusive digital download (MP3 or FLAC)

Image printed on 225gsm Somerset Photo Satin – this has the feel of watercolour paper, but captures the colour and detail extremely well. Hand numbered and signed (by Jon Wozencroft), limited to 100 copies.

A3 archival print | Jon Wozencroft “The Planet is Blue”

The picture was taken from a vantage point in Taormina, Sicily, in April 2001. 1000s of people must have taken a photograph from this spot, so it surprises me that many people single this out as one of their favourite Touch covers and I don’t disagree – how can one take heed of the other versions that will never be seen?

There were no postcards on sale. So instead of playing on the idea of “the photographic moment”, possibly this is a place that conjures up “the photographic universal”.
Giardini Naxos, a railway hub beneath Mount Etna, as seen from Taormina which has amazing food, a Roman amphitheatre and a film festival. I liked the idea of people swimming next to a railway station.

I was overjoyed to get the chance to do a cover for “Substrata”. It is one of my favourite recordings of its time (the progressive year, 1997) and I’d observed how it had such a climatic effect… I’d listened to it, amazed, on holiday in Crete that summer, it became a hot record for me, whilst supposedly being from a cold environment.

Maybe Biosphere was the answer to dub reggae, especially the music of Augustus Pablo. One of the best compliments I was ever paid, came from a friend when she said the Newcastle concert on the 2001 tour was mixed like a Pablo version… Now I’m glad that these versions bear this out, vividly. King Tubby Meets the Rockers in a Coldhouse?

Instinctively, I shot this on 35mm tungsten film which gives it a blue cast, which was an attempt to get a “Day for Night” ambience, (referring to the film by Truffaut). What I didn’t realise was how difficult this would be to print. We scanned it as RGB to get the detail and colour saturation, then we had to work out how to satisfy the CMYK format. There was hardly anything in the black channel.

Taormina features a lot in the film “Le Grand Bleu” (The Big Blue) by Luc Besson. It’s about deep sea diving. It seemed to me an interesting counterpoint to Geir’s love of the mountains, to think of the equivalent below the waterline. [Jon Wozencroft, May 2010]

Audio | Biosphere “Substrata 2.1”

1. Double Exposure 6:38
2. Infinium 7:07
3. The Things I Tell You 8:06

Track Notes:

Double Exposure
File saved: 16.May 2000, 14:08, Lunheim, Tromsdalen
A rebuild of an old track with none of the original elements left.

Infinium

File saved: 8. June 1995, 18:17, Varden, Tromsø
A track that later split into “Hyperborea” and a remix for James.

The Things I Tell You v.4

File saved: 13. September 1995, 21:04, Alarmveien, Tromsdalen
Almost there. Version 5 ended up on the Substrata album.

Spire 3 – Daniel Menche “Hover”

21st May 2010 » Permalink: Spire 3 – Daniel Menche “Hover”

320kbps MP3 – 2 tracks – 27:36

Download-only
2 tracks – 30 piece teenage choir and organ

Track listing:

1. Hover 19:29
2. As Is 8:07

As part of the Spire project, Touch is pleased to announce this download-only release by Daniel Menche.

“I work at a high school library here in Portland, Oregon. Once a week there’s a choir class and occasionally I will poke my head in to hear the fantastic sounds of the kids singing. The singing can be a bit rusty mainly due to the shyness factor in their young voices and the reluctant learning of the music notation from the choir teacher. I really liked hearing that rough-awkward singing from the kids and it remind me of myself being in a choir as a little kid and remembering how much I HATED IT! Mainly because I didn’t understand music notation… nor did I want to and also I was incredibly shy just like these kids.

Well anyways I’m always thinking of ways to get young folks to have fun with sound and such and also I had an idea to use these fine choir students for a recording utilizing their awkward singing sounds. My strategy for the kids was vowels because every kid knows vowels! A-E-I-O-U and just sing those letters as long as possible is what I will instruct the kids to do. I mentioned to the choir teacher that I will be coming in and taking ten minutes of the student’s time to record them for a recorded composition and the teacher approved with this idea but she was also very confused. How can I be a known recording musician and not know about music notation such as ‘flat C or sharp D’ or whatever that jargon is. I told them… “Don’t worry… kids will have fun and it’ll sound fantastic.” And so I barged into the classroom and hit record on my little recorder and began the vowel singing game with the kids. The sheer state of confusion on their young faces was rather beautiful and the singing was fantastic to my ears. I noticed immediately that they couldn’t get the low sounds very well because well… they’re kids and baritone sounds just aren’t in the picture yet for them. So I utilized a Hammond organ for the bass sounds for the final piece of music titled “HOVER”.

Included is the raw unedited “as is” recording document of myself having fun with the kids and getting sounds out of them for this “HOVER” recording. This raw recording has a charm to it of the kids being confused and having some fun. Teenage cathartic-ism to say the least. The look on the choir teacher’s face when I had everyone screaming in different vowels was priceless. I can see her facial expression screaming at me “Music notation blasphemy!!!”… I respond back “Yep, sure is and now look at all the smiles on our kids faces.”

You can preview an extract from this release in the TouchShop.

Buy Hover in the TouchShop

danielmenche.blogspot.com

TO:73 – Jana Winderen “Energy Field”

25th March 2010 » Permalink: TO:73 – Jana Winderen “Energy Field”

CD – 3 tracks – 50m 11s
6-panel digipak
Photography by Jon Wozencroft

Track listing:

1. Aquaculture 18:00
2. Isolation/Measurement 12:11
3. Sense of Latent Power 20:04

Armed with four 8011 DPA hydrophones, DPA 4060 omni mics, a Telinga parabolic reflector mic and a Sound Devices 744T digital hard disk recorder, Jana Winderen studies and records wild places which have a particular importance in our understanding of the complexity and fragility of marine ecosystems.

The recordings were made on field trips to the Barents Sea (north of Norway and Russia), Greenland and Norway, deep in crevasses of glaciers, in fjords and in the open ocean. These elements are then edited and layered into a powerful descriptive soundscape. The open spaces of Greenland, northern winds, ravens and dogs in an icy landscape provide the setting for these haunting but dynamic pieces. Sounds of crustaceans, fish such as cod, haddock, herring and pollock recorded as they are hunting, calling for a mate or orientating themselves in their environment, are all included in the mix. The result is a powerful, mesmeric journey into the unseen audio world of the frozen north.

Artist statement:

“I like the immateriality of a sound work and the openness it can have for both associative and direct experience and sensory perception. I have been occupied with finding sounds from unseen sources of sound, like blind field recordings. Over the last four years I have collected recordings made by hydrophones, from rivers, shores and the ocean, and more recently also from glaciers in Greenland, Iceland and Norway. In the depths of the oceans there are invisible but audible soundscapes, about which we are largely ignorant, even if the oceans cover 70% of our planet. I am also experimenting with different types of microphones to collect sounds which are not obviously recognisable, but give room for broader, more imaginative readings. I use these sounds as source material for composition in a live environment or to create installations, currently also for film, radio, CD and vinyl productions.”

Artist biography:

Jana Winderen is an artist educated in Fine Art at Goldsmiths College in London, and with a background in mathematics, chemistry and fish ecology from the University in Oslo, Norway. She has since 1993 worked as an artist, curator and producer. She currently lives and works in Oslo, Norway. Her most recent sound works include “Evaporation” (2009) at TodaysArt festival in The Hague, Netherlands, “Sub Pelagic Voices”(2009) for ISCM World New Music Days, Sweden, “Colonisers of the undergrowth” at Botanic Sounds in Göteborg Botanic Gardens; “North Atlantic Drift” (2009) for JunKroom in Kyoto, Japan, based on hydrophone recordings in the Barents Sea; “freq_out 7” curated by CM von Hausswollf at the Happy New Ears festival in Belgium (2008); “Submerge” (2008) for Färgfabriken Norr, Sweden and the 6 channel sound installation “+4°C – from Folgefonna to the North Sea” (2007) at Sleppet during the centenary Greig07 in Norway.

She recently released the CD “Heated: Live in Japan” (2009) on Touch (UK), the audio cassette “The Noisiest Guys on the Planet”(2009) on Ash International (UK), the USB stick, “Ants”, the digital download “Submerged” (2009) on Touch and the 7 inch vinyl “Surface Runoff” (2008) on Autofact (USA). Future projects includes an audio commission for the AV festival and the Environmental Agency in Newcastle (UK) working with the river Coquet in Northumberland, the audio piece “The Land Between” for ‘The Morning Line’, Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Istanbul 2010. Jana also works on a collaborating with ‘Mobile Homes’ for the performance ‘Passing Place’ in Norway and she is currently working on a commission for a permanent sound installation at the Knut Hamsun Centre in Hamarøy, Norway. Recently Jana’s underwater recording was played on BBC Radio 3’s “Late Junction”, and BBC Radio 4 followed Jana on her recording trip in the Barents Sea for the radio series “World on the Move”. Jana has exhibited and performed her work in Canada, Japan, USA, Spain, China, Thailand, France, Hungary, Italy, Denmark, England, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, Belgium and Sweden.

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TO:80 – ELEH “Location Momentum”

1st March 2010 » Permalink: TO:80 – ELEH “Location Momentum”

CD – 4 tracks – 71 mins

Track listing:

1. HeleneleH 20:28
2. Linear To Circular/Vertical Axis 2:34
3. Circle One: Summer Transcience 13:33
4. Observation Wheel 11:33
5. Rotational Change For Windmill 12:18

Eleh has been an enigma since the first record under that name was released in 2006. In numbered editions with letterpressed sleeves, usually on Important Records from the U.S.A., these vinyl-only releases were evidently a labour of love and attention. Further recordings have been released on the labels Taiga and Touch, making 11 vinyl editions in all. Eleh began as long ago as 1999 as an exploration of analog synthesis, emphasising low frequency oscillation and resonant acoustic phenomenae. Eleh’s work highlights the physical presence of sound as it has been inspired by the physical world. Following the recent split 12 inch release, “Observations and Momentum”, Eleh has chosen to release the first digital recordings on Touch – “Location Momentum” in a set of five new recordings which will be made openly available on CD. “The stuff that Eleh sets in motion from whatever electronic sound generators he/she deploys represents a measured and methodical paring away of all that might appear superfluous, baroque and rococo. Each of the tracks here consists of just a handful and discrete (and discreet) but highly charged sound events that emerge, overlap, recede and reverberate at critical frequencies over extended durations. At certain crucial points this approach serves as a formula for opening a portal what david Top has referred to as the dark void, that spectral realm magicked into being (or exposed by) the drone, in which audio apparitions and chimeras dance through smoke and mirrors, suggesting the existence of occult planes and dimensions, multiple other realities, worlds within worlds.” (Tony Herrington in The Wire)

T-Phone 1 – Biosphere “Outside By The Fjord”

28th January 2010 » Permalink: T-Phone 1 – Biosphere “Outside By The Fjord”

1 track .m4v video, digital download for iPod/iPhone

Track listing:
1: Outside By The Fjord – 25m09s

From a field recording trip in Sørfjorden, near Tromsø, Norway.
Commissioned by Fondazione Musica per Roma, 2008.

TO:77 – BJNilsen “The Invisible City”

1st January 2010 » Permalink: TO:77 – BJNilsen “The Invisible City”

CD – 8 tracks – 1:04:57
Jewel case with concertina insert
Artwork & Photography by Jon Wozencroft
Plus bonus 320kbps .mp3 download – 1 track – 33:44
TO:77DL – BJNilsen “Live at Café Oto”, Atmospheres 3, 7.xii.09
Available only when purchasing “The Invisible City” via the TouchShop.

Track listing:

1. Gravity Station
2. Phase and Amplitude
3. Scientia
4. Virtual Resistance
5. Meter Reading
6. Into Its Coloured Rays
7. Gradient
8. The Invisible City

About this release:

Recorded and Mixed during 2008-2009 in Berlin.

All tracks composed by BJNilsen using Tape Recorders, Computer, Organ, Acoustic Guitar, Electronics, Viola, Subharchord. Field recordings from; Sweden, Iceland, Norway, UK, Japan, Portugal and Germany. The Subharchord was recorded in the EAM Studio @ Adk, Berlin. Viola played by Hildur I. Gudnadottir.

Mastered by Denis Blackham at Skye
Published by Touch Music/Fairwood Music UK Ltd.

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Tone 40 – Oren Ambarchi “Intermission 2000-2008”

30th November 2009 » Permalink: Tone 40 – Oren Ambarchi “Intermission 2000-2008”

CD in Digipak
Artwork & design: Jon Wozencroft

Track listing:

1. Intimidator
2. Iron Waves
3. Moving Violation
4. The Strouhal Number
5. A Final Kiss On Poisoned Cheeks

Intermission brings together a range of material Oren Ambarchi has contributed to compilations and limited edition vinyl releases between the years 2000 and 2008. Highlights include two live recordings – an early, fragile solo guitar recording taken from a radio broadcast in 2000 and A Final Kiss On Poisoned Cheeks, his powerful 12″ recorded live in Vancouver in 2007 and originally released on Table Of The Elements. Additional tracks include Iron Waves an exclusive track in collaboration with vocalist Paul Duncan and Intimidator featuring Australian pianist/composer Anthony Pateras originally released on Southern Lord.

These are special anomalies in the Ambarchi canon but nonetheless feature the hallmarks of his unique soundworld, all underpinned by his trademark deep guitar tones and meticulous attention to detail. All tracks are newly remastered, many of which are available on CD for first time.

Track notes:

Intimidator Guitars and prepared piano recorded at Jerker House and Enormodome, Melbourne in 2006 Anthony Pateras: Prepared Piano. Originally released on the 2LP version of ‘In The Pendulum’s Embrace’ Southern Lord, USA.

Iron Waves Remix of Paul Duncan’s ‘Parasail’ from the ‘Above The Trees’ CD, Hometapes, USA Guitars, Bells, Cymbals recorded at Jerker House, Melbourne and BJB, Sydney in 2008. Previously unreleased.

Moving Violation Guitars recorded at Jerker House, Melbourne November 2005. A version was originally released on Touch’s 25th anniversary CD, Touch 25, UK.

The Strouhal Number Guitar recorded live at 2SER FM Sydney in 2000 by Tony Dupe’. Originally released on ‘Live & Direct’ CD Spunk/Preservation records, Australia.
A Final Kiss On Poisoned Cheeks Guitar recorded live at Vancouver New Music Festival Oct 17, 2007 by Gary Morgan Bells and motorised cymbal recorded at BJB, Sydney. Originally released as a limited 12″ on Table Of The Elements, USA.

All tracks remastered by Lachlan Carrick at Moose, Melbourne August 2009.

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Tone 39 – ELEH/Nana April Jun “Observations & Momentum”

28th September 2009 » Permalink: Tone 39 – ELEH/Nana April Jun “Observations & Momentum”

Vinyl LP – 2 tracks

Track listing:

1. ELEH – Slow Fade for Hard Sync
2. Nana April Jun – Sun Wind Darkness Eye

About 18 months ago, we were advised of some interesting activity online concerning the nom de bruit of Swedish artist Christofer Lamgren, Nana April Jun; we didn’t know it at the time, because the authorship was something of a mystery. We produced a CD together, The Ontology of Noise in Feb 2009 [Touch # Tone 37], in which one track, particularly, stood out as being perfect for a vinyl edition. In the same timeframe, the series of releases by Eleh on Important Records attracted our attention. These homages to La Monte Young, Pauline Oliveros and Charlemagne Palestine, vinyl-only limited editions stunned us with their acuity and passion for detail… There was something other in the sound. Eleh, also, is an artist who prefers the work to speak for itself, and has other ideas about noise. The digital is questioned by a commitment to a working practice based around analogue tone-generators and letterpress printed covers. The Important Records/Taiga releases are now sought after with a passion by anyone who recognises something truly special occuring. On this new record, Eleh develops the waveforms that the Important Records series started. The split vinyl format is a great meeting point for this idea of digital persona and analogue privacy. The effect, we hope, is for the vinyl to represent a digital question… That this LP summons up a universal sound and an intimate sphere of operations… Which is of course a continuing dilemma. Here is a great opportunity to hear Eleh and Nana April Jun at their finest. Stricly limited edition.

TO:72 – Mika Vainio “Black Telephone of Matter”

24th July 2009 » Permalink: TO:72 – Mika Vainio “Black Telephone of Matter”

CD Album
7 tracks – 54:38
Artwork by Jon Wozencroft

This is Mika Vainio’s 4th solo album for Touch, after Onko [Touch # TO:34, 1997], Kajo [Touch # TO:43, 2000] and In The Land Of The Blind, One-Eyed Is King [Touch # TO:54, 2003]. He is, of course, part of Pan Sonic with Ilpo Väisänen, and also records solo as Ø.

Track list:

1. Roma A.D. 2727
2. Silencés Traverses Des Mondes Et Des Anges
3. Bury A Horse’s Head
4. In A Frosted Lake
5. Swedenborgia
6. A Measurement Of Excess Antenna Temperature At 4080 Ml/S
7. The Breather

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TO:71 – Robert Hampson “Vectors”

13th July 2009 » Permalink: TO:71 – Robert Hampson “Vectors”

CD – 3 tracks – 50:20

Tracklist

1. Umbra
2. Ahead – Only The Stars
3. Dans Le Lointain

Umbra: creation, commande du GRM 2006 for Présences Électroniques Festival, Radio France, Paris
Ahead – Only The Stars: creation, commande du Vibro 2007 for carte blanche au label Vibro Festival, Planetarium ECM Mendes France, Poitiers
Dans Le Lointain: creation, commande du GRM 2008 for Akousma Radio France, Paris.

Recorded at Thirst.
Mixed and mastered at GRM Studio 116A, Maison De Radio France.

Umbra (2006) – is the second commission for GRM. This 16 channel piece had it’s debut performance on the Acousmonium – GRM’s speaker orchestra – at Salle Olivier Messiaen, Maison de Radio France, Paris “The umbra (Latin: shadow) is the darkest part of a shadow. From within the umbra, the source of light is completely concealed by the occulting body. In astronomy, an observer in the umbra is said to be in the shadows experiencing total eclipse.” This phenomenon is a direct influence on the work in the sense of the way that sounds are cast in the shadow of others, slowly becoming more distinct and featured as the piece progresses, materialising and then casting a shadow of their own.

Ahead – Only The Stars (2007) – commissioned by Vibrö for a performance at the Planetarium de Poitiers in 7.1 Surround ratio. Inspired and dedicated to the Astronauts of the NASA Mercury Missions space program and possibly the greatest pilot ever, Chuck Yeager. After the introduction of jets blasting across the soundstage, the piece is then interspersed with radio transmissions (Com. bleeps and static, with dialogue removed) that form the framework.

Dans le Lointain (2008) – the third commission for GRM. A 2 channel Stereo piece, it’s debut performance on the Acousmonium – GRM’s speaker orchestra – at Salle Olivier Messiaen, Maison de Radio France, Paris. Sounds of Shortwave radios, recorded by Hampson in the very early 80’s and recently rediscovered on a cassette, are manipulated through very traditional techniques utilised by early tape experimental works of the GRM and collected with more modern forms of digital manipulation. The title (In The Distance) refers to the distance radio signals can travel, but also the distance of time that elapsed since the shortwave recordings were made on a four track recorder and dubbed onto cassette by Hampson around 1981/82.

Tone 38 – Biosphere “Wireless – Live at The Arnolfini, Bristol”

15th May 2009 » Permalink: Tone 38 – Biosphere “Wireless – Live at The Arnolfini, Bristol”

Touch # Tone 38
CD in Digipak – 62:12
Artwork & Design: Jon Wozencroft

Recorded live at The Arnolfini, Bristol, 27th October 2007 by the doyen of sound recordists, Chris Watson, using 2 x Sony ECM 77s with a Nagra P11 Ares flash card recorder, and from desk to hard drive. The recording was mixed, edited and mastered by Touch stalwart BJNilsen, in Berlin during March 2009.

This concert was part of Touch 25 Live, which also featured a performance of Storm [by Chris Watson & BJNilsen]. Biosphere is Norwegian composer and performer Geir Jenssen, and this is his sixth release for Touch. In the early 1990s he was a pioneer of so-called “ambient techno”, but since then, he has refined his sound into something more magnetic and enduring. His last album, Dropsonde, wasn’t a soundtrack like the interwoven Substrata, nor an episodic journey in the way that Autour de la Lune is. It pushed new directions towards the jazz colors of Miles Davis and Jon Hassell, while re-invigorating the pulse and projection of his signature sound: a hypnotic combination of pleasure and dread. Here Geir Jenssen takes this further, incorporating samples of field recordings by Jony Easterby and trumpet by Anders Karlskås, invoking a sparser, more arresting sound. A landmark release for Biosphere, his first live album, heralding new beginnings without jettisoning the past…

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TO:68DS – Jon Wozencroft A3 print / Rosy Parlane – “Willow”

16th April 2009 » Permalink: TO:68DS – Jon Wozencroft A3 print / Rosy Parlane – “Willow”

A3 print + digital download

A3 print
Features an image (depicted to the right) by Jon Wozencroft, output onto high quality heavyweight matte paper.

Digital download
320 kpbs MP3, available only when purchasing the Willow print…
Rosy Parlane – “Willow” 4:29
Written and recorded in Auckland, NZ Jan-Mar 2008

TO:70DS – Hildur Gudnadottir “Iridescence”

1st April 2009 » Permalink: TO:70DS – Hildur Gudnadottir “Iridescence”

1 Track digital download

Track list:

Iridescence 11:20

Download-only. Featuring Jóhann Jóhannsson & Skúli Sverrisson, this release follows on from her solo album, Without Sinking [Touch # TO:70, 2009].

Mixed and mastered by BJNilsen, Berlin, February 2009.
Image by Jon Wozencroft.

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Tone 36DS – Jana Winderen “Submerged”

1st April 2009 » Permalink: Tone 36DS – Jana Winderen “Submerged”

1 Track digital download

Track list:

Submerged 6:35

Download-only. This release follows on from her debut solo album, Heated: Live in Japan [Touch # Tone 36, 2009]. Submerged was made for an installation for Darkness Descends: Norwegian Art Now in New York City, 5-8 March 2009.

Mastered by Denis Blackham @ Skye, February 2009.
Image by Jon Wozencroft.

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Spire 1 – Jon Wozencroft A3 print / The Spire Ensemble – “Organology”

31st March 2009 » Permalink: Spire 1 – Jon Wozencroft A3 print / The Spire Ensemble – “Organology”

A3 print + digital download

A3 print
Features an image (depicted to the right) by Jon Wozencroft, output onto high quality heavyweight matte paper.

Digital download
320 kpbs MP3, available only when purchasing the Spire print…
The Spire Ensemble – “Organology” 14:14

Recorded at Norheimsund Church, Norway during the Hardingtonar Festival, 21st June 2008. [2008 was the centenary of the birth of Geirr Tveitt, whose work was celebrated at this festival.]

Featured artists: Marcus Davidson – Grand Piano | Mike Harding – Conductor | Philip Jeck – Casio SK1 Keyboard | Charles Matthews – Organ BJNilsen – Electronics | Jana Winderen – Electronics

TO:70 – Hildur Gudnadottir “Without Sinking”

17th March 2009 » Permalink: TO:70 – Hildur Gudnadottir “Without Sinking”

Touch # TO:70
10 tracks – 47.8 Minutes
CD in Digipak
Artwork and photography: Jon Wozencroft

Track listing:

1. Elevation
2. Overcast
3. Erupting Light
4. Circular
5. Ascent
6. Opaque
7. Aether
8. Whiten
9. Into Warmer Air
10. Unveiled

Composed and recorded by Hildur Ingveldardóttir Gudnadóttir in Berlin and Reykjavík. Hildur played cello, zither, processors and voice.

Additional recordings by Skúli Sverrisson; bass and processors on all tracks except track 7, Jóhann Jóhannsson; organs and processors on tracks 2, 3 and 9 and Gudni Franzson; clarinet and bass clarinet on tracks 7 and 10.

Cello no. 49 was made by David Wiebe in 1991.

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Tone 37 – Nana April Jun “The Ontology of Noise”

12th February 2009 » Permalink: Tone 37 – Nana April Jun “The Ontology of Noise”

5 Tracks – CD – 36:40

Track list:

1. The One Substance
2. Process Philosophy
3. Space-Time Continuum
4. Semantic Shift
5. Sun Wind Darkness Eye

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Tone 36 – Jana Winderen “Heated: Live in Japan”

14th January 2009 » Permalink: Tone 36 – Jana Winderen “Heated: Live in Japan”

2 tracks – CD – 27:54

Track list:

1. Tetsuro Yasunaga 1:25
2. Jana Winderen 26:29

Live performance at Super Deluxe, Tokyo, 24th October 2008. Source material recorded with 2 x 8011 DPA hydrophones, 2 x DolphinEAR/PRO hydrophones and 2 x 4060 DPA microphones on a Sound Devices 744T recorder in Greenland, Iceland and Norway.

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Tone 29 – Philip Jeck “Suite: Live in Liverpool”

14th January 2009 » Permalink: Tone 29 – Philip Jeck “Suite: Live in Liverpool”

LP – 5 tracks – 31:49
[vinyl only through Autofact, USA]

Track list:

Side A
1. Press
2. Intro Roll

Side B
1. Live With Errors
2. All That’s Allowed
3. Chime, Chime

Recorded at Hive, FACT, Liverpool on 25th October 2006 as part of Touch 25, live to a M-Audio Mictrotrack 24/96
Edited by Philip Jeck April 2007
Cut by Jason at Transition 14th May 2007 on a Neumann VSM 70
Released on Autofact 14th January 2009
Design and photography by Jon Wozencroft

“Suite: Live in Liverpool” follows Philip Jeck’s acclaimed collaboration with Gavin Bryars and Alter Ego on a new version of ‘The Sinking of the Titanic’ (Touch Tone 34). It is the companion release to his latest solo album, ‘Sand’; a set of five new compositions that highlight Jeck’s mastery of vinyl manipulation, personal and collective memories.
During the past year Jeck has refined and consolidated his unique sound, playing superb sets at last summer’s Faster than Sound festival and at York Minster for Spire. He has recently released ‘Amoroso’ [Touch # TS01, 7″ vinyl only with Fennesz] where he responds to Charles Matthews’s homage to Arvo Pärt.

‘Suite’ is at once elegiac, celebrational, mournful and uplifting. Those who have followed Jeck’s development since his first release, “Loopholes” (Touch TO:26) will observe his return to the industrial textures that coloured that collection, though here they are fused with his symphonic grace and continued development as a composer and live performer.
Philip Jeck studied visual art at Dartington College of Arts. He started working with record players and electronics in the early ’80’s and has made soundtracks and toured with many dance and theatre companies as we as well as his solo concert work. His best kown work “Vinyl Requiem” (with Lol Sargent): a performance for 180 ’50’s/’60’s record players won Time Out Performance Award for 1993. He has also over the last few years returned to visual art making installations using from 6 to 80 record players including “Off The Record” for Sonic Boom at The Hayward Gallery, London [2000].

Philip Jeck works with old records and record players salvaged from junk shops turning them to his own purposes. He really does play them as musical instruments, creating an intensely personal language that evolves with each added part of a record. Jeck makes geniunely moving and transfixing music, where we hear the art not the gimmick.

This is Philip Jeck’s 6th solo album for Touch after ‘Loopholes’ [Touch # TO:27, 1995], Surf [TO:36, 1998], Stoke [TO:56, 2002], ‘7’ [TO:57, 2004] and ‘Sand’ [Touch # TO:67, 2008].
He recently performed on “The Sinking of the Titanic” with Gavin Bryars in Rome, about which Boomkat (UK) said: “The most noticeable addition is Jeck, whose expertise and unique style seems to fit like the final piece of the puzzle as his crackles and motifs melt into the architecture of the recording as if they had always been there. This additional layer of nostalgia brought forth by these found sounds adds a significant sense of history, forcing the mind back into hazy film footage and decomposed photos, a perfect match for the subject matter.”

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TO:76 – Fennesz “Black Sea” [CD]

14th November 2008 » Permalink: TO:76 – Fennesz “Black Sea” [CD]

CD – 8 tracks – 52mins
[also available on vinyl LP and as a CD/LP bundle.]

Track list:

1. Black Sea
2. The Colour of Three
3. Perfume for Winter
4. Grey Scale
5. Glide
6. Glass Ceiling
7. Vacuum
8. Saffron Revolution

Christian Fennesz used acoustic and electric guitars, synths, electronics, lloopp and computers

All tracks composed, performed, recorded and mixed by Christian Fennesz at Amann Studios, Vienna and C-street, Paris except “The Colour of Three” by Christian Fennesz & Anthony Pateras and “Glide” which was composed and performed by Rosy Parlane & Christian Fennesz (recorded live in Paris and then edited and mixed at Amman Studios).
Black Sea is Fennesz’s 4th solo album for touch and his first since Venice in 2004.

“Black Sea is the much-anticipated new album from Christian Fennesz, his first since “Venice” [Touch # TO:53, 2004], about which US magazine Stylus wrote:

“Fennesz does with sound what Stan Brakhage did with film, altering its very fabric and texture, employing disorder and error as forms of communication and expression. He forces you to learn a different method of perception and interpretation, to look beneath the chaos that seems to govern the movements of life and find the patterns beneath.” [Nick Southall]

Fennesz’s career has come a long way since “Instrument”, his debut for Mego in 1995, and his first solo album “Hotel Paral.lel which followed in 1998. “Endless Summer” [Mego, 2001] brought him to a much wider audience and “Venice” underlined his mastery of melody and dissonance. His songs usually embody the skilful application and manipulation of dense sonic textures with a genuine feel for the live, and real-time.

Black Sea features guitars that rarely sound like guitars; the instrument is transformed into an orchestra. Fennesz lists the elements used to make the compositions: “Acoustic and electric guitars, synthesizers, electronics, computers and live-improvising software lloopp.”
On ‘Glide’, Fennesz duets with Rosy Parlane (NZ) [www.rosyparlane.com], whose work is also released on Touch. Fennesz also teams up with eMego artist Anthony Pateras’s (AUS) [http://www.anthonypateras.com], whose prepared piano features on “The Colour of Three”. Fennesz pushes his work into a more classical domain, preferring the slow reveal to Venice’s and Endless Summer’s more song-based structures.

Jon Wozencroft’s artwork makes visible this carefully hidden world resting beneath the surface of “the first impression”. A series of shots, taken in quick succession as the tide recedes, reveals a world of specific activity only visible at a particular time and place, histories appearing and disappearing.

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